Police bail emergency bill to be rushed through parliament on Thursday

Sir George Young announces reaction to controversial legal ruling that time spent on police bail counted towards the 96-hour limit of pre-charge detention

Leader of the House of Commons Sir George Young says emergency legislation to reverse the legal ruling on police bail will go through the Commons on Thursday.
Photograph: Martin Godwin for the Guardian

Monday 4 July 2011 11.22 EDT
First published on Monday 4 July 2011 11.22 EDT

Emergency legislation to reverse a controversial legal ruling on police bail will go through all stages in the Commons on Thursday.

The leader of the House, Sir George Young, said peers would then consider the police detention and bail bill early next week.

The move to rush through new laws comes after ministers told MPs that waiting for the results of an appeal to the supreme court would take too long.

The initial ruling, made by a district judge and backed by a judicial review at the high court, means officers can no longer bail suspects for more than four days without either charging or releasing them.

Young's announcement came as three supreme court justices were considering an application from Greater Manchester police (GMP) to stay the judgment pending a full appeal at the same court on 25 July.

The row started when district judge Jonathan Finestein, sitting at Salford magistrates court, refused a routine application from GMP for a warrant of further detention of murder suspect Paul Hookway on 5 April.

High court judge Mr Justice McCombe confirmed the ruling in a judicial review on 19 May, which meant time spent on police bail counted towards the maximum 96-hour limit of pre-charge detention.

For the past 25 years, police and the courts have only counted the time spent being questioned or in police custody towards the limit, with many suspects being released on bail for months before being called back for further interviews.

The shadow home secretary, Yvette Cooper, claimed it had led to police failing to arrest domestic violence suspects who breached bail conditions, leaving alleged victims vulnerable.

The Home Office has been criticised for not acting sooner to reverse the ruling but the home secretary, Theresa May, told police chiefs: "There is a clear need to act fast to make sure we put things right for the police."

Policing minister Nick Herbert announced that emergency legislation would be used an hour after receiving legal advice from the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo), she said.

"There is no question that I will always give the police the tools and powers they need to catch criminals, investigate crimes and protect the public," May said.

Herbert admitted last week that officials were told of the oral judgment in May, but its full impact only became clear when the written judgment was handed down on 17 June and ministers were alerted on 24 June.

Sir Norman Bettison, the chief constable of West Yorkshire police, highlighted the problems the ruling caused his officers last week, saying they were left "running round like headless chickens ... wondering what this means to the nature of justice".

About 85,200 people are on bail in England and Wales at any one time and the common practice in most major inquiries of releasing suspects on bail and calling them back for questioning weeks later was "pretty much a dead duck" after the ruling, police chiefs said.